CBS: ObamaCare forcing millions to lose their insurance

posted at 8:01 am on October 25, 2013 by Ed Morrissey

And that number comes from a UCLA expert interviewed by CBS who supports the ironically-titled Affordable Care Act. Around 14 million people buy their own health insurance on the individual markets, which is actually about the same as the true number of Americans uninsured by circumstance rather than choice. Half of those insured will lose that insurance thanks to the mandates imposed by ObamaCare, and will get forced to buy new policies. UCLA public health policy director Gerry Kominski says that they will get a better product with more protection, but don’t tell that to Natalie Willes:

“I was completely happy with the insurance I had before,” Willes said.

So she was surprised when she tried to renew her policy. What did she find out?

“That my insurance was going to be completely different, and they were going to be replaced with 10 new plans that were going to fall under the regulations of the Affordable Care Act,” she said.

Her insurer, Kaiser Permanente, is terminating policies for 160,000 people in California and presenting them with new plans that comply with the healthcare law.

“Before I had a plan that I had a $1,500 deductible,” she said. “I paid $199 dollars a month. The most similar plan that I would have available to me would be $278 a month. My deductible would be $6,500 dollars, and all of my care after that point would only be covered 70 percent.”

Do the math here. Willes will have to pay $948 more a year for the new policy, but that’s not all. She will also have to another $5,000 extra on top of that to get past the deductible each year before she gets any benefit from the policy at all. If she’s reasonably healthy, all of her medical costs will get paid straight out of her pocket, on top of her insurance policy costs which will now total $3,336, or almost a cool $10,000 after the deductible before she sees any benefit at all.

Who’d bother to buy insurance under those conditions? Only the sick and infirm, or those who suddenly get that way and can now force insurers to cover them when they need care. The website is only the portal to much larger problems, and Americans who suddenly experience the trauma of sticker shock will not be pleased to live through what Barack Obama and Democrats have done to their finances.

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That story was out this morning…in a lot of states the Medicaid enrollment is up 87%!!!…the system will collapse before they get the stupid website working…

PatriotRider on October 25, 2013 at 8:35 AM

This is a “feature” which guarantees that the non-paying base will show up to vote. The ultimate plan is :
1. Get the maximum number into Medicaid and Medicare.
2. Force those that lose their coverage into the exchanges.
3. Bankrupt the insurance companies through price controls and regulations.
4. Bring back the “public option” to receive those that lose coverage as the insurance companies fold.
5. Implement single payer since there is really nothing else left.

If the Dummies win in 2014 this plan will go forward full speed. Even if they lose, only the speed of implementation will be reduced since Hussein, having nothing to lose as well as a veto pen, will continue his regulation spree to at least force the implementation point 3.

Another thing Obama Care is going to do, is start to make people realize how much their employers are actually paying for their insurance. Some people get great employer health insurance policies and have no idea that their employers are paying $5000 to $10,000 a year for those policies. They just see their “co-pay” and perhaps their monthly premium. I have friends that are more interested in making an extra $2 or $3 grand a year in salary, than having comprehensive coverage that might have costed an employer $10K a year becuase they either don’t understand or don’t think they need health insurance. That is obviously their choice, but not something I would do. This whole process is going to cause sticker shock not only to how much Obamacare actually costs, but how great a lot of people with employer covered health care actually had it.

Now, if only we could get the government to change the way taxes are collected, maybe people who otherwise don’t pay attention would start to realize how much of their paychecks are going to taxes! I don’t see the Democrats (or Republicans for that matter) setting up any websites or regulation changes anytime soon where employees pay their taxes bi-weekly, rather than having employers confiscate them from their employees’ checks for the government every pay period.

I found this story also, the only person who’s rates actually went lower was the lady with pre-existing conditions, which is great for her. The other thing that I notice is the belief by these folks that it will get better and cheaper. Has that ever happened?

If she’s reasonably healthy, all of her medical costs will get paid straight out of her pocket, on top of her insurance policy costs which will now total $3,336, or almost a cool $10,000 after the deductible before she sees any benefit at all.

Maybe so, but I bet now she gets free birth control. So there!!

PackerBronco on October 25, 2013 at 9:41 AM

A big ‘improvement’ in coverage under Obamacare is that it now will cover therapeutic use of baby aspirin, ie daily regular use to help prevent heart attacks. Just imagine the savings!

“Do the math here. Willes will have to pay $948 more a year for the new policy, but that’s not all. She will also have to another $5,000 extra on top of that to get past the deductible each year before she gets any benefit from the policy at all. If she’s reasonably healthy, all of her medical costs will get paid straight out of her pocket, on top of her insurance policy costs which will now total $3,336, or almost a cool $10,000 after the deductible before she sees any benefit at all.”

And Cruz took arrow after arrow for trying to stop this nonsense. FROM BOTH SIDES

Due to the year long extension that Obama gave businesses, my daughters company has stopped their contributions to their healthcare. It will save them money since they are struggling and then next year they can decide whether it makes sense to pay the fine or continue to contribute.

It is my recollection that the ACA “monkeys” with health savings accounts, and I can’t remember it or look it up, so I will ask: What has happened to the health savings account under ACA?

This young lady in the video needs $6500 in cash to pay her deductibles this year, and she needs $80 per month more to pay her premium…$1060 more in cash to pay her premium.

I think republicans should get Ben Carson to Capitol Hill to extoll the virtues of the Health Savings account.

It is unlikely that this young lady will spend enough in claims to satisfy her $6500 deductible.

BUT and THEREFORE, if she could put that $6500 into an accruable medical savings account, that is hers, that accrues from year to year, and put in before taxes, in ten years, she will certainly have more than $30-50K in her own medical savings account and have little need for anything but perhaps a hospitalization plan. Or she can use this tax free account even to pay premiums from, when she wants to.

I think we need a WAIVER for accruable medical health savings accounts. There is no way that people have the money sitting around to pay 100% their medical bills once they spend all their money on useless insurance.

And right now, a health savings account with $6500 in it ought to be enough to qualify as satisfying the Obamacare mandate especially if it is combined with a hospitalization MINI plan (currently banned by the ACA.)

I went to Colorado Cares last night and it is the same in CO.
$6,000 to $10,000 in deductibles and $70 dollar office visits from Kaiser plus $320/month.
Big price tag for subsidizing low income users, worse than catastrophic care.

I found this story also, the only person who’s rates actually went lower was the lady with pre-existing conditions, which is great for her. The other thing that I notice is the belief by these folks that it will get better and cheaper. Has that ever happened?

Cindy Munford on October 25, 2013 at 11:38 AM

The government could have given the 114,000 people with pre-existing conditions free insurance for life for less than the cost of the crappy website.

I found this story also, the only person who’s rates actually went lower was the lady with pre-existing conditions, which is great for her. The other thing that I notice is the belief by these folks that it will get better and cheaper. Has that ever happened?

Cindy Munford on October 25, 2013 at 11:38 AM

The government could have given the 114,000 people with pre-existing conditions free insurance for life for less than the cost of the crappy website.

oceansidecon on October 25, 2013 at 12:09 PM

Good point.

The whole controversy over pre-esisting conditions is however mostly a big LIE. Most of the people that claim they ‘can’t get insurance’ because of pre-existing conditions really mean that they can’t get insurance that they like the price of.

Once you tell insurers that it’s not ok to tell people with pre-existing conditions to crawl into a corner and die, you can’t let people opt in only when severely ill. That would be comparable to letting someone buy flood insurance the day floodwaters start rising.

bayam on October 25, 2013 at 8:49 AM

Except that people CAN opt in anytime they want. They will pay a penalty that’s smaller than purchasing healthcare up until the time that they do decide to opt in.

The crowning irony is that a Democratic and ONLY Democratic)health care bill designed to extend the umbrella of coverage to tens of millions of formerly uninsured individuals will have the REVERSE effect of UNinsuring tens of millions more. To wit: Companies with 49 or fewer employees will not expand in order to keep the oppressive yoke of Obamacare off their backs–thus denying insurance to all their employees. Companies will hire part-time in lieu of full time–thus, again, relieving them of the Obamacare collar.

But where the fit will really hit the shan is where part-time and uninsured employees (as well as millions of the unemployed) will be FORCED by penalty of law to insure OR ELSE. OR ELSE currently seems to be a fine (depending on family size)rang from $95 up to about $500–which may be unenforceable if millions refuse to pay it.) Which would you rather do? Be forced to buy lousy insurance (if indeed you are able to buy it!!!!!) at $6-9,000 a year or pay a $250 fine? And when the tax man cometh to collect the fine, recite the old Chinese proverb…YUCK FOO!!!

Once you tell insurers that it’s not ok to tell people with pre-existing conditions to crawl into a corner and die, you can’t let people opt in only when severely ill. That would be comparable to letting someone buy flood insurance the day floodwaters start rising.

bayam on October 25, 2013 at 8:49 AM

What on earth makes you think it makes any sense for an “insurer” to subsidize someone with a pre-existing condition?? How is the pre-existing condition the insurers’ fault?

Do you even know what “insurance” is? If someone has a pre-existing condition, then they are more expensive to insure.

If you want to argue that society should absorb that cost, make that argument. If you think the government specifically should compel society to absorb that cost, then make that argument – you’d probably even get some of us to agree with you if the assistance was really limited to the truly needy.

The idea that you think someone selling a product (in this case the insurer) should have a special responsibility to absorb a loss on that product is insane, and of course the only way to make such a ridiculous scheme not cause a complete collapse of the industry is to compel other people to buy the same coverage, which for them is much less costly, at a price higher than they would be willing to pay.

And of course, you idiots were so sure that you understood how insurance works (“That’s what insurance is” countless idiots on the left have preened for the last few years – “people who have low risk subsidizing people with high risk”).

This is what you get when a bunch of idiots who have never run a business in their life decide that they understand the economy.

Everyone who had a health insurance plan that did not cover contraception now has a new plan. One that covers it. And they have no choice in the matter. Comrade O has dictated all health insurance plans must cover it.

…you can’t let people …

bayam on October 25, 2013 at 8:49 AM

Socialism in nutshell.

You can’t let people do what you don’t want them to do. You can’t let them choose to buy or not buy what the want or don’t want. The government must tell everyone what to do, what they must buy, what they cannot buy, etc. For the good of the collective socialist hive.

“A socialist policy is abhorrent to the British ideas of freedom. Socialism is inseparably interwoven with totalitarianism and the object worship of the state. It will prescribe for every one where they are to work, what they are to work at, where they may go and what they may say. Socialism is an attack on the right to breathe freely. No socialist system can be established without a political police. They would have to fall back on some form of Gestapo, no doubt very humanely directed in the first instance.”

It is my recollection that the ACA “monkeys” with health savings accounts, and I can’t remember it or look it up, so I will ask: What has happened to the health savings account under ACA?

This young lady in the video needs $6500 in cash to pay her deductibles this year, and she needs $80 per month more to pay her premium…$1060 more in cash to pay her premium.

I think republicans should get Ben Carson to Capitol Hill to extoll the virtues of the Health Savings account.

It is unlikely that this young lady will spend enough in claims to satisfy her $6500 deductible.

BUT and THEREFORE, if she could put that $6500 into an accruable medical savings account, that is hers, that accrues from year to year, and put in before taxes, in ten years, she will certainly have more than $30-50K in her own medical savings account and have little need for anything but perhaps a hospitalization plan. Or she can use this tax free account even to pay premiums from, when she wants to.

I think we need a WAIVER for accruable medical health savings accounts. There is no way that people have the money sitting around to pay 100% their medical bills once they spend all their money on useless insurance.

And right now, a health savings account with $6500 in it ought to be enough to qualify as satisfying the Obamacare mandate especially if it is combined with a hospitalization MINI plan (currently banned by the ACA.)

Fleuries on October 25, 2013 at 11:49 AM

Your idea would be a GREAT one… except for the fact that it’s been outlawed according to the ACA (along with your hospitalization MINI plan).

“A socialist policy is abhorrent to the British ideas of freedom. Socialism is inseparably interwoven with totalitarianism and the object worship of the state. It will prescribe for every one where they are to work, what they are to work at, where they may go and what they may say. Socialism is an attack on the right to breathe freely. No socialist system can be established without a political police. They would have to fall back on some form of Gestapo, no doubt very humanely directed in the first instance.”

– Winston Churchill

farsighted on October 25, 2013 at 7:59 PM

With the war unfinished, Churchill was rejected by the voters for his extreme, out-of-touch opposition to socialism, consisting of statements just like that – statements that were dead on the mark and only seem wiser as years go by.

It’s not so bad to be accused of being “extreme”, “out of touch” and so on. In the long run, the truth may prevail, and in any case it’s better to be with the truth-tellers than with the liars.

With the war unfinished, Churchill was rejected by the voters for his extreme, out-of-touch opposition to socialism, consisting of statements just like that – statements that were dead on the mark and only seem wiser as years go by.

It’s not so bad to be accused of being “extreme”, “out of touch” and so on. In the long run, the truth may prevail, and in any case it’s better to be with the truth-tellers than with the liars. – David Blue on October 26, 2013 at 9:42 AM

For the British the war was really over. The Pacific theater had been turned over to the United States.

“A socialist policy is abhorrent to the British ideas of freedom. Socialism is inseparably interwoven with totalitarianism and the object worship of the state. It will prescribe for every one where they are to work, what they are to work at, where they may go and what they may say. Socialism is an attack on the right to breathe freely. No socialist system can be established without a political police. They would have to fall back on some form of Gestapo, no doubt very humanely directed in the first instance.”

– Winston Churchill

farsighted on October 25, 2013 at 7:59 PM

I watched the special on Fox News last night about Charles Krauthammer, whom I consider the foremost conservative talking head on TV and columnist currently in Washington. Krauthammer believes that Churchill was the most important man of the 20th century. Time magazine chose Einstein. I believe that Krauthammer is right.